Thanks!
How To Persuade My Daughter to choose Junior Cert Business
- Thread starter taytoman
- Start date
My younger son gets all concerned about his future; how he'll do in the Leaving Cert (he's in first year), if he'll get the points for the college course he wants even though he doesn't know what he wants to do, if he'll get a job, etc..
I tell him not to worry and that he has a realistic prospect of living to be 100 so he can change career or job or direction in life any time over the next 20 years. He can go back to college in his 20's or 30's, basically relax about his future because he has no idea of what it holds. He works hard in school so I can say that without him taking it as permission to slack off.
Lets face it, how many people posting here would do things differently if they had the chance to start over. It's crazy that our futures should be restricted by choices we make at 15 or 16 when we choose our Leaving Cert subjects.
I suppose my point is that you should let your daughter find her own way in life, make her own choices. Your job is to support her and guide her when she looks for guidance and to let her know that the path has many turns, right up to the finishing line, and that she should not be afraid to take a few of them if the road she is on is not bringing happiness. Ultimately all we can hope for for our children is that they are happy and reasonably fulfilled in life. That comes in many forms and wealth is way down the list of things that brings it.
Last edited:
I agree completely but the most useful things I learned in school were from extra-curricular such as debating and team related activities.
Most of my education has come from books and personal research. The ability to research a subject in a structured way came from preparing for debates. I remember little of the Biology and mathematics I learned in school and being dyslexic the time I spent learning Irish and French was a complete waste of time. That said Biology gave me a keen interest in genetics and sociology but the Maths I use today I learned in work and through college.
Yes promulgated by those well known commies in our catholic schools and dept of education !!
Commies is a bit strong. Rampant socialists and never had to work in a competitive environment or worry about losing their job because of their own performance or the general economic environment. And no, I'm not saying that they don't work hard or that they aren't skilled. I am saying that they have no idea of the pressure and worry experienced by people running a business.
I think that this posters daughter is lucky, as in my opinion (I am a qualified teacher of Business Studies, though I do not teach it at present) the structure of the subject at JC is dreadful and more likely to put a young person off business than inspire an interest.
To offer the Op a constructive suggestion. I have a print subscription to the Economist which I deliberately leave lying about hoping my kids will pick it up from time to time. I have often seen them reading it over the cornflakes and recently the eldest took it to his room to finish some article.
This might be a bit much for a first year but may be a good idea in a year or two.
Commie/Rampant Socialist, I'll take the lot from Citizen Purple and Comrade MTK. But, I did work in a competitive environment and did lose my job (perhaps not due to my performance) but in the "Economies of Scale" environment that was forced on others and me. Oh! and I don't know pressure and worry running a business? Oh Comrade Purple, how innocent you are! Even despite your dynamic gung-ho outward appearance. Long live the revolution! . . . and the Beards!
Phew! For a second there I thought it was a course on those double decker vehicles with numbers 15A, 46A written high up on their front.
I was talking about teachers, specifically those who teach business studies, not chin-curtained commissars or their supporters. The latter groups cannot all shield themselves from reality and so it will encroach on their ideology every now and then.
Don't shoot the messengers.
Would you prefer that they left out some sections of the syllabus in their teaching of the subject prescribed by the Dept?
There would be some fun and games when the topic that is anathema to some would turn up on the state exam!
"Talk to Joe" would have a field day!
Marion
Here we have an indictment of what Ireland has become. A boy starts secondary school and where his character should start to shine and his personality develop he is prematurely concerned about his distance future. But, the boy is lucky that outside of school he has somebody (Purple) who can keep him on the real direction of the rest of his life. While I would not swap my lot with that of teachers and they have a difficult job, our secondary education system has become a points race within a rat race. We have lost sight of what we were and should be.
Before we ruin the life of thousands (perhaps millions over time?) is it time to shout stop? We're producing a conveyor belt of talented paper holding qualified humans who see little of working reality and their only experience of life is second-hand through teachers and lecturers.
The problem is that the syllabus doesn't do what it says on the tin. It's not the study of business and, in the vast majority of cases, is is being delivered by people who have no experience of business.Don't shoot the messengers.
Would you prefer that they left out some sections of the syllabus in their teaching of the subject prescribed by the Dept?
There would be some fun and games when the topic that is anathema to some would turn up on the state exam!
"Talk to Joe" would have a field day!
Marion
I've read all the posts on the subject regarding persuasion of a teenager to choose junior cert business. We're talking about 13/14 year olds here. Most of us didn't know what we wanted to do until we could get nothing else probably on which we had reached our 20's. What if the young lady in question wanted to become an airline pilot and didn't have the ability and parents could not afford the fees Is it time for us to step back and just leave the student decide what he/she wants rather than what we (or the teachers) want?